Hurley Pediatrics Program Director Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha talks during a press conference with Michigan Senate Minority leader Jim Ananich (D-Flint) regarding the Flint water crisis before the start of Gov. Rick Snyder's State of the State address on Tuesday, Jan. 19, 2016.

FLINT, MI -- The pediatrician who established a link between Flint water and elevated blood lead levels during the city’s water crisis has won an inaugural award for her courage and humanism from two foundations.

Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha then donated the $10,000 prize to a nonprofit that helps Flint children.

Hanna-Attisha -- known as Dr. Mona -- has received the Vilcek-Gold Award for Humanism in Healthcare from the Vilcek Foundation of New York city and The Arnold P. Gold Foundation of Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, according to an announcement from the groups.

The award includes an unrestricted cash prize of $10,000, which Hanna-Attisha has pledged to donate to the Flint Kids Fund, part of The Community Foundation of Greater Flint.

“With this new joint award, we are so pleased to extend the foundation’s annual honors to recognize foreign-born healthcare professionals who embody the very core of healthcare: humanism joined with scientific excellence,” Gold Foundation President and Chief Executive Officer Dr. Richard I. Levin said in a news release. “As our first honoree, Dr. Hanna-Attisha provides a historic mark with her unwavering and courageous commitment to patients and the well-being of our nation.”

Hanna-Attisha’s research helped expose the consequences of rising levels of lead in city water in 2015 -- a doubling of the percentage of infants and children with elevated blood lead levels citywide.

Within days of announcing the results of the study, support for disconnecting the city from its water source at the time -- the Flint River -- soared, and the following month the city was reconnected to Lake Huron water.

Although the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services initially questioned Hanna-Attisha’s research, officials later acknowledged its legitimacy.

Flint Kids Fund was established by May 2016 by the Community Foundation of Greater Flint as a conduit for raising and and distributing funds to serve the long-term health and development needs of Flint children and their families.

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